> I would like a book which covers in good detail the inner workings> of a compiler, without resorting to terse mathematical> formalisms. Some math is okay, though, it shouldn't be simplicity> all the way either. The book should invite the reader to try things> out for himself, so something which is just source code is not> appreciated. I have some experience with lexical scanners and> parsers, having written a few myself (and used lex and yacc). I am> fluent in C, but I do not mind the author using different> languages. I'm more interested in the ideas behing the compiler> rather than the language the ideas are expressed in.

I would suggest Appel's book: a good approach to almost all aspects of
compiler design is done in a nice way. I have the JAVA version. I
believe the others should be good enough. One problem with Fraser and
Hansen's approach is that the optimizations are not covered in
sufficient detail (IMHO).